Our terrain would be less difficult in many respects than Japan and by 2050.....it would be the better par of a HUNDRED Years since Japan built their first Bullet Train....it would be kind of embarrassing not to done something like this by then! Mind you....it is QQQqquuueeeeennnnnnsssllllaaannnddddd.......

1. Shikansen in Japan has an average of 353 million users annually over ~2,700km of track. A Brisbane - Sydney "Shikansen", at ~900km, even if you scaled down the patronage sixfold, would still need to carry about 58 million people - or the entire population of Qld about 13 times over.2. Our terrain is still reasonably difficult to get HSR through, plus you have the flood problem to deal with.3. We simply don't have the population to support it. Sydney is ~6-7x smaller than Tokyo, Cairns & Townsville are smaller than even the smallest major centre on the Shikansen line, Brisbane would be barely a provincial city in Japan.4. The distances between Australian cities are huge, with a lot less between them than there is in Japan. The distance between Tokyo and Osaka is roughly equivalent to the distance between Maryborough and Coolangatta.5. Australia's culture is still very car-centric. Do you really think anybody in Tokyo could realistically own a car given how big the city is and given the premium on space? By comparison, most people in Brisbane still own a car, and if going within their city to a non-CBD destination, will drive.

Finally, and the most basic point, why would we spend tens of BILLIONS of dollars on HSR when people cannot use PT reliably to even get to work? There is easily $5-10bn worth of infrastructure to be built in each capital city, in addition to regional transport programs, that you could fund and still have more wanting after that.

Every time this HSR foam comes up in the forums, RBoT loses a little bit more credibility. The issue has been done to death, it's foam and it detracts from the real campaigns we need to focus on (fixing #railfail, bus network reform).

Negative people... have a problem for every solution.Posts are commentary and are not necessarily endorsed by RAIL Back on Track or its members. Not affiliated with, paid by or in conspiracy with MTR/Metro.

1. Shikansen in Japan has an average of 353 million users annually over ~2,700km of track. A Brisbane - Sydney "Shikansen", at ~900km, even if you scaled down the patronage sixfold, would still need to carry about 58 million people - or the entire population of Qld about 13 times over.2. Our terrain is still reasonably difficult to get HSR through, plus you have the flood problem to deal with.3. We simply don't have the population to support it. Sydney is ~6-7x smaller than Tokyo, Cairns & Townsville are smaller than even the smallest major centre on the Shikansen line, Brisbane would be barely a provincial city in Japan.4. The distances between Australian cities are huge, with a lot less between them than there is in Japan. The distance between Tokyo and Osaka is roughly equivalent to the distance between Maryborough and Coolangatta.5. Australia's culture is still very car-centric. Do you really think anybody in Tokyo could realistically own a car given how big the city is and given the premium on space? By comparison, most people in Brisbane still own a car, and if going within their city to a non-CBD destination, will drive.

Finally, and the most basic point, why would we spend tens of BILLIONS of dollars on HSR when people cannot use PT reliably to even get to work? There is easily $5-10bn worth of infrastructure to be built in each capital city, in addition to regional transport programs, that you could fund and still have more wanting after that.

Every time this HSR foam comes up in the forums, RBoT loses a little bit more credibility. The issue has been done to death, it's foam and it detracts from the real campaigns we need to focus on (fixing #railfail, bus network reform).

EVERYTHING begins where it is initially most viable, as I said, come 2050 it would be embarrassing for us not to have progressed HSR in Australia. Again 2050....not mid-2018! [Personally, I'd like to see us get bold and aim for 2030...but that'd scare the "you-know-what" out of the great unwashed]....might get in the way of a footy stadium or 10...we sure have plenty of them.....and other short-term politics driven govt handout programs.....

The time adjusted cost and technology, per KM, of building a HSR corridor and rolling-stock around 2050 would be a shadow on what Japan encountered almost a hundred years earlier!

I don't think the smaller markets of Australia waited for 100yrs to pick up on the value of the electric toaster or personal computer!

Track improvements and new alignments with two tracks up to Hervey bay and Bundaberg. Electrification from Mackay to Cairns via Townsville if it isn't under water yet? Who knows maybe only parts of the leg needs to have catenary due to new trains with fast charging capabilities. Good for regional areas. Further more I don't know how much power is required for HSR? But catenary is a proven method to maintain power to a very fast train for many years to come.

EVERYTHING begins where it is initially most viable, as I said, come 2050 it would be embarrassing for us not to have progressed HSR in Australia. Again 2050....not mid-2018! [Personally, I'd like to see us get bold and aim for 2030...but that'd scare the "you-know-what" out of the great unwashed]....might get in the way of a footy stadium or 10...we sure have plenty of them.....and other short-term politics driven govt handout programs.....

The time adjusted cost and technology, per KM, of building a HSR corridor and rolling-stock around 2050 would be a shadow on what Japan encountered almost a hundred years earlier!

I don't think the smaller markets of Australia waited for 100yrs to pick up on the value of the electric toaster or personal computer!

"Embarassing"?? California has barely started construction on HSR between San Francisco and Los Angeles, after decades of debate and a lot of expense. The pressure that went into this?- LA has five (!!!) airports, LAX in particular congested to all hell, SFO regularly fog-bound with two other airports in its metro area to act as a relief valve.- LA is a city with a population of 18.6 million, San Francisco 8.75 million.- Interstate 5 (the fastest route between LA and SF) has been fully grade separated for decades, and is 6-8 (total) lanes in parts.- The corridor between LA and SF is dotted with numerous sizeable cities, such as Fresno (~1 million), Bakersfield (~850k), and has the potential to link to San Diego (~3.4 million) should they proceed with Phase 2 and extending the like ~220km south to there.

Compare this to Sydney & Melbourne:- Sydney & Melbourne both have one airport (two if you count Newcastle and Avalon respectively), both have plenty of domestic capacity available.- Sydney has a population of 5.03 million, Melbourne a population of 4.73 million.- The Hume Hwy was only fully grade separated around four years ago, and is four lanes (total) wide outside of the urban areas.- The biggest city on the HSR corridor is Canberra (~400k), followed by Albury-Wodonga (~100k). There are no other towns near, or above, 100k population between Sydney and Melbourne.

Do you see the issue? The case to link Sydney & Brisbane by HSR is even worse.

Finally, your analogy of HSR and the toaster is bizarre. An electric toaster is purchased for personal consumption for as little as $10-$20. A personal computer can be purchased for as little as $300-$400. HSR, assuming it cost a similar amount, will cost $62.4 billion, or over 10 Cross River Rails - which is a massive project in itself.

I think if Australia ever gets HSR, it might push to the Sunshine Coast.

However, Cairns to Brisbane won't make sense because even at maglev speeds it won't compete time wise with aviation.

Long term in Qld, I think we would see a service all the way to Cairns as a political/tourist service, but as those cities grow I think "local" passenger services could happen, eg Cairns to Townsville, Gladstone

Back in the 1990s, QR proposed to turn the North Coast Railway into a high speed 25 tonne axle load line. I think that they ran out of money and left some low speed (40kph)alignments between Townsville to Cairns and Gympie to Bundaberg because of the cost of realigning the timber bridges. I think that these remaining timber bridges are now being replaced on these low speed alignments as QR/TMR can't afford the cost of high speed deviations . This will make HSR into an SSR (S = Slow) for these sections.

We shouldn't be pushing for HSR. We should be pushing for MSR. Have the majority of the NCL between brisbane and cairns aligned for 160km/h non tilting passenger trains. Preferably electrified as well, which would benefit freight. I put forward the return of electrically hauled freight because you can't double stack with narrow gauge. Having the whole line with a minimum curve radius of 100km/h, with the majority of it bouncing between 140-160 would mean brisbane-cairns could be done in 16 hours on a passenger train and 24 hours for 100km/h freight.